Methods for plying or twisting yarns or filaments



METHODS FOR FLYING OR TWISTING YARNS OR FILAMENTS Filed July 12, 1967 Jan27fl97 H. WHITTIAKEZR ETAL '7 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 Jan 1. 27, 1979 H, WHITTAKER ETAL 3,491,528

METHODS FOR FLYING OR TWIS'IING YARNS 0R FILAMENTS Filed July 12, 1967 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 United States Patent /66 Int. Cl. D02g; D0111 13/26, 7/02 US. Cl. 57-156 2 Claims ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE The method of down twisting individual yarns from a beam to individual twisting stations constituted of bobbins to thereby form a package of twisted yarn or groups of yarns. A further uptwist is applied to individual yarns or groups of yarns at their stations without removing the packages from their stations, and the yarns or groups of yarns are wound back on the beam or another beam.

The present invention relates to a method of and apparatus for twisting yarns or filaments. The textile yarns include staple fiber yarns as well as continuous filament yarns.

In the production of vehicle tire cords, for example, it is usual to supply material on a beam from which are wound a plurality of individual yarns or filaments. The yarns or filaments are unwound from the beam and each is individually twisted and wound onto a bobbin to provide thereon a predetermined length of twisted yarn or filament. The bobbins are then transferred to a cabling machine, where the twisted yarns are unwound from the bobbins and taken two or three together to twisting stations where they are twisted together and wound onto further bobbins which, when full, are taken to the creel of a loom to form the warp supply for the fabric being woven. A disadvantage of this conventional procedure is that it requires the use of a very large number of bobbins, representing a high proportion of the capital and maintenance costs of the processing plant.

It is an object of the present invention'to provide an improved method of and apparatus for plying or twisting yarns or filaments in which fewer bobbins are required and less handling of yarn packages is necessary between twisting operations.

According to one aspect of the present invention there is provided a method of twisting yarns or filaments including the steps of providing a supply package comprising a plurality of yarns or filaments wound on a beam, downtwisting the yarns either individually or in groups to form at each of a plurality of twisting stations a package of twisted yarn or group of yarns, subsequently applying further twist to the individual yarns or groups of yarns by uptwisting them from the various packages at the twisting stations, without removing said packages from the twisting stations, and taking up all the uptwisted yarns or groups of yarns onto the said beam or onto another beam or beams.

Although the delivery speed of the yarn during downtwisting may be substantially the same as that during uptwisting, the speed of rotation of a twisting spindle at each twisting station is preferably greater during downtwisting than during uptwisting, whereby the bulk of the twist to be applied is imparted to the yarn during the downtwisting step.

According to a further aspect of the present invention,

there is provided apparatus for twisting yarns or filaments,

comprising a supply package support for supporting a supply package including a beam carrying a plurality of yarns or filaments, a twisting frame having a plurality of twisting stations, a twisting unit at each twisting station adapted in operation to take up a yarn or group of yarns from the supply package, apply twist thereto and build a package of twisted yarn at each of said twisting stations, and means whereby on completion of the building of the various packages at the twisting stations the direction of feed of the material can be reversed and twisted material subjected to further twist as it is withdrawn from the twisting stations and taken up onto either the beam of the supply package or another beam or beams.

The twisting stations preferably each comprise a ring and traveller type spindle.

The aforesaid supply package support may comprise a rotatable drum whereon the supply package rests when in position.

The apparatus may include delivery rollers arranged to be driven to withdraw yarn from the supply package for feeding to the twisting stations, and means for directly rotating the supply package to effect the subsequent withdrawal of twisted material for the twisting stations; such means for directly rotating the supply package, which may also be employed during the downtwisting step in order to assist the action of the delivery rollers if desired, may for example comprise a drive applied directly to the beam and variable in speed to maintain a constant tension on the yarns.

Alternatively, the apparatus may comprise means for rotating said drum so as to drive the supply package either to feed out or to take up yarn, depending upon the direction of rotation of the drum, and further comprising rollers which are mounted in the yarn path between the supply package and the twisting stations and which are arranged to be driven, in either direction of rotation at will, so as to assist in the feeding of yarn from the supply package to the twisting stations and, subsequently, to assist in the withdrawal of twisted material from the twisting stations; in this case, the means for rotating the drum may advantageously comprise a drive taken from one of the said rollers.

One embodiment of the present invention, a doublesided twisting frame of the ring and traveller type, will now be described by way of example with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:

FIG. 1 is a diagrammatic end view of part of the frame and shows the apparatus during the downtwisting step,

FIG. 2 is a diagrammatic view similar to FIG. 1 but showing the apparatus during the uptwisting step,

FIG. 3 is a diagrammatic View of part of the frame from one side thereof during the downtwisting step, and

FIG. 4 shows an alternative type of bobbin which may be used instead of the type shown in FIGS. 1, 2 and 3.

As indicated above, in this exemplary embodiment of the invention the apparatus takes the form of a doublesider twisting frame, that is tosay, it includes two rows of twisting stations, one row on each side of the frame, with all the twisting stations being arranged to be supplied with yarn from a single supply package. For simplicity of illustration and description, only the left hand row of twisting stations (as seen in FIGS. 1 and 2) is represented in the accompanying drawings but it will be appreciated that the construction and operation of the stations in the right hand row are exactly similar.

The twisting frame in this exemplary embodiment is provided with 144 twisting stations, 72 on each side of the frame, and each such station comprises a twisting spindle 1 which is adapted to be driven from a central shaft 2 by way of a continuous tape drive 3. The shaft 2 provides the drive for all the twisting spindles in the frame, and each tape drive 3 is operative to cause rotation of a number of adjacent spindles 1. The twisting spindles are mounted on stationary spindle rails 4 and each supports a bobbin 5 which, in the embodiment illustrated in FIGS. 1, 2 and 3, comprises a central cylindrical stem with terminal flanges. With each twisting station there is associated a ring and traveller indicated generally at 6, and all the rings on each side of the frame are interconnected by a common ring rail (not shown) which is arranged to be traversed by a conventional builder motion to cause yarn 7 delivered to the respective travellers to form packages on the associated bObbins 5.

The yarn for all the twisting stations in the frame is supplied from a single supply package comprising a plurality of individual yarns wound on a beam 8, the beam having terminal yarn-retaining flanges 9. The supply package is mounted above the spindles 1, being supported partly by arms 10 pivoted at 11 and partly by a snbjacent rotatable drum 12, and, since there are 144 separate twisting stations in the frame, there are 144 individual yarns wound on the "beam 8.

Before the twisting operation is commenced, the ends of all the yarns on the beam 8 are pulled out from the supply package and passed over an idler roller 13. Thereafter the yarn path divides, 72 of the yarn ends being passed to the left-hand row of twisting stations, as illustrated, by way of a further idler roller 14, driven delivery rollers and 16, and a thread guide or lappet 17, each yarn end then being passed through the traveller associated with its own particular twisting station. The remaining 72 yarn ends are passed from the roller 13 around a further idler roller 18, and thence to the driven delivery rollers and lappets which are associated with the right'hand row of twisting stations (not shown).

In operation the downtwisting step, the yarns may be pulled off the beam 8 simply by the driven rotation of the rollers 15 and 16. This withdrawl of the yarns from the supply package may, however, be assisted by the provision of a separate drive 19 from the roller 16 to the drum 12 (shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 only), whereby the drum 12 is caused to rotate in the direction indicated by the arrow in FIG. 1 and, because of its frictional contact with the yarn carried by the beam, in turn causes the supply package to rotate in the opposite direction. Whichever of these yarn-withdrawing methods is adopted, the yarn is delivered to the ring and traveller 6, by way of the path described above, and the ring and traveller traversed to lay the twisted yarn onto the bobbin 5 in any desired build. The amount of yarn initially wound on the beam 8 in the supply package is arranged to be sufficient to fill the various bobbins 5 with the desired amount of twisted yarn during the downtwisting step, and on completion of this step the frame is stopped and prepared for uptwisting.

Such preparation entails disengaging the ring rails from the builder motion and fixing the ring rails, with the various rings and travellers 6, at the uppermost end of their traverse, as shown in FIG. 2, and also necessitates reversing the direction of drive to the yarn. If, in the downtwisting step, the rollers 15 and 16 were used alone to pull the yarn ends from the supply package, separate driving means for the beam 8 will now be used in the uptwisting step; such driving means, which will normally have been held inoperative by a clutch during downtwisting, may take the form of a variable speed belt drive 20 engaging wharfs in extension of the beam 8 at each end thereof. However if the drive 19 to the drum 12 was used in the downtwisting step, mere reversal of the drive to the rollers 15 and 16 will be sufficient to reverse the direction of drive to the yarn during the uptwisting operation.

When these preparations for the uptwisting step have been made, the frame is re-started and the already partially twisted yarn 7 is pulled from the various bobbins 5 through the respective travellers, the latter now functioning in the manner of the fiyers conventionally employed with uptwisting spindles to assist winding off, and is forwarded by the driven rollers 15 and 16 to the beam 8 Where it is wound as fully twisted yarn. During the uptwisting step the speed of delivery of the yarn is substantially the same as that during the downtwisting step, but during uptwisting the speed of rotaion of the spindles 1 is less than that employed during downtwisting, since it is preferred to apply the bulk of the required twist to the yarn during the latter step. This provides a condition in which the yarn tensions during uptwisting and downtwisting can be maintained more uniform.

The supply package containing the fully twisted individual filaments is now in a form ready for feeding to a cabling machine where a similar process, involving d0wntwisting followed by uptwisting, may be repeated. In the cabling machine, two or three of the twisted yarns are taken together to each twisting station and twisted together to form a two-fold or three-fold cord. During uptwisting, further twist is imparted to the cords which are then wound back on to the same beam. The cords on this beam may then be rewound on to further beams of the required size for the loom, and weaving may then be from beam instead of from bobbin. 1

It will be appreciated from the above description of the downtwisting and uptwisting steps, that the bobbins 5 serve only as containers between the two stages of twisting, and, if desired, these bobbins could form an integral part of the twisting machine. The bobbins used for the successive downtwisting and uptwisting steps may be of any desired type to suit particular circumstances and,'in order to assist the take-off of the yarn during uptwisting, it may be preferred to use the type of bobbin which is illustrated in FIG. 4, wherein the central tube 21 gradually increases in diameter over part of its length to present a frustoconical formation 22, the wider diameter end of this formation terminating in the particular one of the end flanges 23 which is to be the lowermost in use. When employing bobbins greater than 9 inches in length it has been found preferable to use bobbins of the type shown in FIG. 4 in order to prevent excessive tension when the yarn is being unwound from the bobbin during the uptwisting step.

It will have been appreciated that the method according to the present invention can be applied to the individual twisting of yarns or filaments, as in the yarn twisting operation described with particular reference to FIGS. 1, 2 and 3, or to the twisting together of a plurality of yarns or filaments as in the cabling operation also referred to above.

It will also be understood that the fully twisted yarn or filaments may be wound back onto the original supply beam, as described in relation to the illustrated embodiment, or may alternatively be wound onto a different beam. 'For example, during a cabling operation the cabling machine may be fed from a twister beam having 144 ends and two-fold cords prepared by twisting the ends in pairs and winding onto 72 bobbins, thereby producing 72 ends of cabled cord which may then be twisted and wound back onto the same beam. Where a threefold cord is required, the twisting frame may be fed by one beam having 144 ends and the material wound back onto beams 72 ends each. Three of these beams may then be employed in a cabling machine, giving a total of 216 ends, and the 72 bobbins would be filled with three ends per bobbin. The material from the bobbins would then be wound back onto the three beam-s with 24 ends per beam.

Although the beam 8 in the illustrated embodiment of the invention is shown as mounted above the spindles 1, it will be appreciated that it could alternatively be mounted, for example, at the end of the frame.

What we claim as our invention and desire to secure by Letters Patent is:

1. A method of twisting yarns including the steps of providing a supply package comprising a plurality of yarns wound on a beam, downtwisting the yarns either individually or in groups to form at each of a plurality of twisting stations a package of twisted yarns, uptwisting by applying further twist to the yarns from the various packages at the twisting stations without removing said packages from the twisting stations, and taking up all the uptwisted yarns onto a beam.

2. A method according to claim 1 including the steps of delivering the yarns to and twisting the same on rotat- 10 References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,400,026 12/1921 Chadwick 5775 2,119,728 6/1938 Turcotte 57-104 2,887,840 5/ 1959 Ridgeway 5763 XR 3,111,804 11/1963 Beyer 57-104 XR FOREIGN PATENTS 826,854 1/ 1952 Germany.

168,359 8/ 1921 Great Britain.

385,954 4/ 1931 Great Britain.

180,934 3/ 1936 Switzerland.

OTHER REFERENCES German printed application B 27,116, October 1955, Chlupacek.

STANLEY N. GILREATH, Primary Examiner 15 WERNER H. SCHROEDER, Assistant Examiner US. Cl. X.R. 

